The Dominion WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1908. THE NATIVE LANDS MUDDLE.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 315, 30 September 1908, Page 6

The Dominion WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1908. THE NATIVE LANDS MUDDLE.

The descent of a deputation yesterday upon tho Prime Minister to urge the codification of the laws relating to Native lands, was a ' very remarkable political event. For years these laws have been a puzzle to everybody, layman •and lawyer alike, and for years the Government has been talking of "settling" the Native land question. Every year a Bill ■ has been introduced by a Minister with Boleran self-satisfaction, and the public have on each occasion believed that the question was indeed at last to be settled. Instead, each Bill has complicated still further the tangle that it pretended to straighten out. And accompanying this extraordinary policy there have always been in the mouths of Ministers tho most serious references to the overwhelming importance of the Nativo land difficulty. It is a long time sinco the Native Minister foreshadowed " a comprchensivp measure," in the contented anticipation of which the Houso agreed to tio the annual knot in the already tangled skein. Not only has tho Government year by year failed to cope seriously with a difficulty the importance of which is everywhere admitted, but it has actually sought to superimpose on the confusion a policy that runs counter to the country's interests. In one of their reports last year, the Native Land Commissioners, Sir Robert Stout and Mr. Ngata, went in full detail into the character of tho chaos that has rcsultod from tho present and previous Government's paltering with the question. They showed that tho " sharp changes or oscillations of policy " had, as long ago as 1873, produced such results as are thus described by the Royal Commission of 1891:—"The pernicious conscquenccs of Native-land legislation have not been confined to tho Natives, nor to tho EuroP.q&us mora immcdkUdy, .coaccrnud in

dealing with them for land. The disputes then arising have compelled the attention of the public at large, they have filled the Courtsj of the Colony with litigation, tiiey have flooded Parliament with petitions, given rise to continual debates o£ veryf great bitterness, engrossed the time of .Committees, and, while entailing very fycavy annual expenses upon the Colony, have invariably produced an uneasy public feeling." Sincc that date the confusion has been intensified beyond tolling, as the Commissioners made abundantly clear. let, in the face of Sthis deplorable state of affairs, and inj the face of its own statement that the Native land problem is one of the most! important national problems at the present time, the Government has done nothing, or, rather, it has done worse than! nothing, since it only moved to make bonfusion worse confounded. We have actually had to wait for the apprehensions of members of Parliament to crystallise into a solemn deputation to the Government before getting, not a promise that a policy will be framed, but a half-promise that the confusion will bo cleared away, and the position revealed uponlwhich a policy may be built. In his rejily to the deputation, the Prime Minister appears to have been wholly unconscious that the Government has been at ail to blame in the .matter. ■ The subject,' ho. said—and wo add, alas!—" had been discussed by the Ministry more than once," and. ho expressed approval of the suggestion that a commission should be appointed to codify the laws and remove the present chaotic condition of things. They had not, he informed the; deputation, " reached the end of Native land legislation." As if the deputation's request had not been that a sensible beginning should be made! "The wh'ple subject," he said in conclusion, " was; one of very great importance, and the (Government had to sec that Native land, j already apportioned by existing legislation for settlement, was settled in the jintcrests of the country as a whole." AY hen w,e remember the sins of omission and commission, for which " the interests of tho country as a whole " have been made responsible, wo can fully realise tho valuo of the Prime Minister's reply.. The difficulty of the problem is enormous, but enormous, too, is the evil that will result from the postponement; of a proper settlement. Who can calculate tho loss to the country that hasi developed from the ill-usage and non-usage of the vast areas of .Native land, or the injury that has resulted from the assistance which the non-settlement of the problem has afforded to tho Government's efforts in the past dozen years to keep up land values for taxation purposes?. Thcro should be no delay in codifying the laws, at. whatever cost, and unravelling the tanglo produced by the hands of apathy and incompetence. But the Prime Minister said nothing sufficiently definite to dispel the suspicion that the old method will go on, with a new Act every year to intensify the 'wrongs of the Natives and tho injury suffered by tho ; country.